Harry Carey

Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)

[8] Jimmy Stewart gives a career-defining performance in this Frank Capra classic about a celebrated boy scout leader (Stewart) who gets chosen to fill a deceased senator’s seat in the U.S. congress. His party assumes Stewart will be a doting yes-man, seriously underestimating his sense of duty and patriotism. When he introduces legislation that conflicts with a corrupt land deal, the party tries to take …

Happy Land (1943)

[6] Don Ameche stars as a small-town pharmacist who learns his son has died during combat in WWII. Sent into an emotional tailspin, the ghost of his late grandfather (Harry Carey) comes to his rescue. Grandfather and grandson take a trip down memory lane, revisiting all the expected high and low points of life, while we the audience get to know the young man who …

Red River (1948)

[7] John Wayne stars in this Howard Hawks western about a tyrannical cattle farmer who invests over a decade of work into the mother of all cattle drives, only to have it threatened when his adopted son — played by Montgomery Clift — launches a mutiny against him. I always love to see Howard Hawks playing with gender roles and male archetypes, and Red River …